Electronic multiplying machine



April 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2 2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACil-IINE Filad March 1, 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 1 COMPUTE M P GOMMUTATOR REGISTER SECONDARY COMMUTATOR COMMUTATOR MO REGISTER 0.3. SWITCH PUNCH DISTRIBUTOR MAGNETS A H) 8 (RH) 0 (RH) ACCUMULATOR ACCUMULATOR ACCUMULATORS IN VEN TOR.

CARL A. BERGFORS 'BYVWW.

ATTORNEYS April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1. 1954 19 Sheets-sheet 2 TO }DISTRIBUTOR 606 280 COMPUTE COMMUTATOR PR PUNGHING CARD HANDLING, FROM ACCUMULATOR READING AND F|G.2n-388 PUNCHING To MP REGISTER MECHANISMS H620 g RESET ACCUMULATORS 58 MC REGISTER TENS SECONDARY COMMUTATOR MC REGISTER UNITS 256 IN V EN TOR.

CARL A BERGFORS ATTORNEYS FIG-.2d BY April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,829,327

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1, 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 3 IN V EN TOR.

a 2 b I BY VCARL AEyRGFORS ATTORNEYS April 8, 1958 C. A. BERGFORS Filed March 1. 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 4 COLUMN SHIFT T COMMU ATQR 544 REGISTER INVENTOR.

CARL A. BERGFORS ATTORNEYS April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,329,827

I ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1. 1954 1e Sheets-Sheet 5 TO MGREGISTER RH OUTPUTS T0 MC REGISTER LH OUTPUTS 4 IN V EN TOR. CARL A. BERGFORS ATTORNEYS April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1. 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 6 COLUMN SHIFT 300 SWITCH (a). (4) (5) (6) (n (a)- 25 26 INVENTOR.

CARL A. BERGFORS F I6. 26 BY ATTORNEYS April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,329,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1, 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 7 TD COMPUTE COMM.

(9) (l0) (l0 (l2) 7 -56 E5 INVENTOR.

CARL A. BERGFORS ATTORNEYS April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1, 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 8 T ORDER INVENTOR.- v

FIG-2g BY ATTORNEY S .CARL A. BERGFORS I April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Fiied March 1. 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 9 IN V EN TOR.

CARL A. BERGFORS YWW ATTORNEYS April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1, 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 10 I ATO B TRANSFER UNIT IN VEN TOR.-

BY 'CARL A; BERGFORS ATTORNEYS 7 April 8, 1958 Filed March 1, 1954 DISTRIBUTOR C. A. BERGFORS ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE FIG.2k

l9 Sheets-Sheet l1 INVENTOR.

CARL A. BERGFORS ATTORNEYS P 8, 1958 C.'A'. BERGFORS "2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1, 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 12 B COMPONENT ACCUMULATOR 22 TH ORDER H ORDER 1T ORDER U ORDER IN V EN TOR.

i 2 m CARL A. BERGFORS ATTORNEYS April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed Marh 1. 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 13 INVENTOR.

ATTORNEYS ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1. 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 14.

C TO B TRANSFE R UNIT 278 494 DISTRIBUTOR IN V EN TOR.

CARL A. BERGFORS ATTORNEYS April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,829,827

I ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1, 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 15 C COMPONENTS ACCUMULATOR H ORDER IN VEN TOR.

FIG 2 p BY CARL A'. BERGFORS ATTORNEYS April 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS 2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March 1, 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 16 I INVENTOR.-

Fl 7 BY CARL A. BERGFORS ATTORNEYS April 8,1958 0. A. BERGFORS I 2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACIII-IINE Filed March 1. 1954 19 Sheets-Sheet 17 F 30 ELECTRONIC TIMING DIAGRAM MP TENS MP TENS MP UNITS Mc-I-4-s-' MC-2- MC-l-4-8- I COMPUTE CYCLE I 2 3 I WIRE 240 LFLHJIJWLFL-I'LFU'LHJ'TJ'LILJ'LFLFIM WIRE 242 WWW-WW sTART CAM P" I TRIGGER TI04 J- v TRIGGER 1102 I I WM 490 sI I I I 492 $2 j I I F! COMPUTE 494 $4 II j I'I COMMUTATOR 49G sa J7 I I cI j I'I J1 SECONDARY F r- COMMUTATOR TIO7 I I I csl I I COLUMN sz I SHIFT cs3 COMMUTATOR cs 4 cs5 -I- WM 270 I I I -2- 272 I J J -4- I 274 J I I -a- 276 J JI I sEc. ADVANCE 530 Y Y Y- c.s. ADI/ANCE I84 V oa CARRY OPERATE 279 Y L I GARRY RESTORE 2eo I COMPUTE STOP 236 TIME INVENTOR.

CARL A. BERGFORS ATTORNEYS A r l s, 1958 2 c. A. BERGFORS 2,829,827

ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Filed March '1. 1954 1e Sheets-Sheet 1s INVENTOR. CARL A. BERGFORS ATTORNEYS Aiaril 8, 1958 c. A. BERGFORS ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE l9 Sheets-Sheet 19 Filed March 1. 1954 mOFDmEhQQ 22,602 5... 33: $6 m 35%.: co 3%: mm m mm 6319mm 2638.. mEEum 22 $2: 5... 3,65 m w INVENTOR. .CARL A. BERGFORS mOhDmEhQQ AIS , -om ms 03 em 7 nm mOkDmEhmE Emiy v QE 4 ATTORNEYS United States Patent 2,829,327 ELECTRONIC MULTIPLYING MACHINE Carl A. Bergfors, San Jose, Calif., assignor to International Business Machines Corporation, New York, N. Y., a corporation of New York Application March 1, 1954,-Serlal No. 413,198 32 Claims. (Cl. 235-61) It is the object of this invention to provide certain improvements in systems of the kind described and claimed in an application Serial No; 404,157, filed January 15, 1954, by Arthur H. Dickinson and entitled Electronic Multiplying System. The improvement is directed particularly to a practical compromise between the incompatible requirements of speed and circuit simplicity in systems of this kind. I

In the Dickinson system, multiplication is etiected by controlling the flow of pulses representing binary code components (bits) which can be selected to form all possible products which the system may be required to calculate. This is done by sending the pulses through a partial product matrix constituted by a group of nine multiplying plates one of which is selected by a multiplier (MP) register to have its pulse output filtered by a multiplicand (MC) register which thereby produces the bit components of the product. As in the system of this application, the MP register is in decimal form, i. e., it has a ten stage counter for each of the decimal digits or orders of the MP. The function of this MP register is to choose for operation that multiplier plate which corresponds to the particular MP digit registered for the multiplication problem at hand, and that multiplying plate is constructed so that it will produce all of the bit pulse components necessary to multiply that MP digit by all possible MC values. For simplification of the system, the multiplier plate produces both the LH and RH components of the product or partial product. The pulses produced by the selected multiplier plate are delivered to the MC register, the function of which is to select only those pulse components necessary for the multiplication of the digit registered in the MP register by whatever quantity is registered in the MC register.

The MC register in the Dickinson system is disclosed in two forms; in a first embodiment, it is decimal; and in a second embodiment, it is binary. This means that in the decimal MC register the MC digit can be registered by a single counter tube, but in the binary register it may require a number of tubes depending upon how many binary components or bits are necesasry to form the MC digit involved.

The purpose of the decimal MC register is to afford the system maximum speed in operation; if, as is then the case, only a single counter tube per order is involved in the MC register during multiplication, then multiplication can be effected in one compute cycle per MP digit. The purpose of the binary MC register is simplification of the circuitry; with it the system requires fewer tubes than with the decimal MC register. The simplification is, however, at the expense of speed;'with p CC the'binary MC register, multiplication requires four compute cycles per MP digit. The reason for the latter slower operation is that where the MC is indicated by several tubes in the MC register the system offers the possibility of confusion between simultaneously occurring pulses unless four compute cycles per MP digit are used, i. e., some of the bit pulses which should be counted separately will, in fact, be counted together so that the system may register only -1- when it should register -2- or more. The use of the four compute cycles displaces all such pulses in time so as to avoid any possibility of their conflicting with each other.

In the present system, it has been found possible to displace potentially conflicting pulses of the latter type spacially, as an alternative or supplement to a displace ment in time. This spacial displacement is accomplished by sending pulses to additional component accumulators, i. e., whereas the Dickinson system used only two product accumulators, the present system uses three or more. The net result is a compromise between the speedier principal embodiment of the Dickinson system and the slower but structurally simpler modification with the binary MC register. The present system is less complicated in circuit arrangements than the principal embodiment butjaster than the modification in that it uses fewer compute cycles.

There follows a description of an illustrative system incorporating the present invention. The Fig. l of the drawings shows this illustrative system in a schematicform. The Fig. 2 with its alphabetical subdivisions (2:: to 2h, inclusive, 2i, 2k and 2m to 2q, inclusive), which complete a continuous drawing if laid down from left to right in alphabetical order, illustrates a complete circuit diagram; while the lfig. 3 is an electronic timing diagram of the Fig. 2 circuit. The Fig. 4 is an extract sketch from the Fig. 2 which will aid in the understanding of the system.

In many respects, the present system is similar to that of the Dickinson application which may, therefore, be referred to for an understanding of the basic mode of operation of multipliers of the kind here involved. The inventive features of the present system Will be out as the description proceeds.

Referring to the Fig. l, the system is designed to read a multiplier (MP) and a multiplicand (MC) from perforations in appropriate digit columns in the MP and MC sections of the card 1 and, after performing the necessary multiplying operations, to punch the product in terms of perforations in appropriate digit columns in' the PR section of the card 1the motion of the card, the reading, and the punching being substantially as in the Dickinson application. The MP is registered in the MP register 2 which has a ten-stage counter for each digit or each order of the MP. The MC is similarly registered in the MC register 3 which, however, has a binary counter for each MC digit or order. Thus, the MC register has four counter stages for each MC digit or order, the stages being respectively for the -l-, 2, -4 and 8- bits so that any decimal digit in the MC taken from the card 1 may be registered in terms of combinations of these four components. 1

The source of all bit pulses which are to be used selectively to perform the multiplication is the pulse emitter or computecommutator 4 which generates cyclically a series of six pulses, the first of which reprepointed I 

